AO 4 Ch 3

Chapter 3

I leaned back against Maribelle, the woman massaging my shoulders amid the ruins of the fort. The Garrish army had been stalled long enough that I had been dismissed to find a little rest and possibly some food amid the rubble.

Well, I just moved the heavy things.

Emlyn was digging through the ruins, finally coming up with a shout of victory. "I found something!" she yelled. She moved over the mound, holding a barrel that was cracked and leaking smelly water like it was her pride and joy.

I wrinkled my nose, immediately knowing what was in the barrel, as did everyone else. 

"Fish," Maribelle said, sparing Emlyn only a glance before going back to the stubborn knot in my shoulder. God she was good at this. 

"It's something," Emlyn said with emphasis, plopping the barrel down next to me. "You said you were starving."

What sort of fish smelled that bad? 

"I don't know if I'm that hungry, though," I replied, glancing out over the pass where Garrish soldiers were continuing to clear the pass.

"Well, it's not like we can go hunting right now." Emlyn crossed her arms.

I grumbled, relenting and knowing this was likely the best I was going to get. It seems that when a fortress collapses it crushes most of the food. "Let's see what we're dealing with." 

Emlyn cracked open the barrel, bringing a more intense fishy smell to all of us. She managed to pull out a whole fish. The barrel had done enough to protect the fish during the collapse, even if it was cracked and the water inside had drained. 

Aurelia was quick to pick one out and flip a knife out of her boot, skinning the fish in absolute record time. We all blinked, watching the woman work as she put the skin aside and continued to cut the fish up. 

"How many more of those do we have?" I asked, peering into the barrel and getting the answer myself.

There were only a handful of fish left in the barrel.

"These won't last long," I said, before an idea came to me. I picked up the fish skin that Aurelia had discarded, waving my hand over it. 

"What are you doing, sir?" Maribelle asked. 

"Honestly, it's a mix between prayer and desperation," I replied. My hand waved over the fish skin, pale fishy flesh emerged. It was taking quite a bit of magic to try and heal the fish from its skin, but it wasn't the stupidest thing I had done lately.

Granted, I had survived all of the stupid things I had done, that was a minor miracle in itself. But a palm's worth of flesh had regrown on the skin. I peeled the skin off once again and handed Aurelia another fish filet. 

"Well, if we get really desperate, I think I can keep us fed. Though, you'll forgive me that I'm not particularly excited about this method. Is it even safe to eat?" Emlyn poked at the filet as Aurelia used her hands as a cooking surface, heat coming off and quickly cooking the fish. 

"Not a clue," I admitted. "It's fish, though, and we can certainly give it a try.”

“Does it really count as fish?" Emlyn asked, staring at it further. 

"It counts as fish if you close your eyes and try hard enough. Goddammit Emlyn, you're going to be the first to try it." I glared at her.

Aurelia finished up and handed the one I’d made Emlyn, who closed her eyes as she nibbled on the very end of the fish.

She closed her eyes, almost as if she was in pain, consuming the fish before she squinted them open and continued to chew. "It's actually not that bad."

I threw my hands up in the air, "Of course it's not that bad. I made it."

Aurelia frowned at me, which was fair considering she was doing the cooking while I was sitting and being massaged by Maribelle.

"You know what I meant. I didn't cook it but I certainly did plenty of the work. I literally produced that with my own flesh. It's pretty much my baby."

Emlyn slapped her face. "Of course. Now I'm eating your baby. You just had to go and make it worse."

"No, Emlyn, you're supposed to say you want my babies." I teased her.

"I'm not entirely sure we should ever let Ard have babies." Emlyn let out a dramatic sigh. “One of him is already enough for the world.”

"I mean, it's a little late for that. They're coming," I pointed out. Sierra and Selina were both pregnant when I’d left The Capital.

"And are we sure it’s a good idea?" Emlyn countered.

"Hey, that is not entirely fair. Someone clearly wanted to have my babies."

"Yes, and we will be questioning their sanity for the rest of time," Emlyn said dryly.

"I don't know if I would go that far," I said, "After all, it's quite the prestigious honor."

Emlyn held out a hand. "Please stop now. Save yourself. I've already... I will submit that you are allowed to split fish into more fish. I don't think I could take whatever was... wherever that was going."

"Fair enough," I said and quickly changed the topic, leaning back against Maribelle as she massaged my shoulders. The woman had fantastic hands. 

The situation with the Garrish army rolling forward wasn't going to be solved any time soon, so it was best to settle in and prepare.

Aurelia handed me the real fish as I continued to make more from the skin.

A little food in my stomach helped me blink off the drowsiness that had been threatening to put me under. I glanced over, looking for Zuri, but she wasn't with us. I looked around a bit more, spotting her talking quietly with Melida further down the wall. I patted Maribelle's hands and got up, taking the last few filets that I had made to use as a peace offering for what I hoped was going to be a fruitful conversation. 

I walked up to the group with a stack, realizing only as I got there that Brusset would probably need more. "I'm sure I can make a few more in a minute," I interjected myself into the conversation. 

"Good enough," Melida took one look at me and the way I was looking at Zuri before accepting her fish and making herself scarce, pulling away Brusset and Finley with her. 

Zuri turned to me. "Well, you just scared her off.”

“I was hoping to talk with you." I grabbed Zuri's hand.

The tall, thin, dark-skinned woman stared back at me. She seemed fine, however, there wasn't quite the same vibrance to her eyes. It would be easy to chalk that up to the sleep deprivation we were all undoubtedly feeling. However, I knew that Zuri was still struggling. 

"You know, it's okay not to be okay," I told her. 

"Oh, thank you for your permission," she said with a small curtsy. 

"That's not what I mean, Zuri. We learned that Colin--”

“We haven't had time to figure anything out," she said, "until we know more, we should not make assumptions." 

I gave her a soft smile and held her hand. "Right, okay. After this is done, though, we will make that a priority, okay?"

"Of course.” She said, her words clipped.

“It's important to reconnect lines of communication as soon as possible. Military one-oh-one,” I smiled at her, doing my best to put joy into the words. 

If she was currently going to be in denial, then I would meet her where she was and continue to support her through whatever path of grieving that she chose. I had lost my parents, not just once, but twice, and I understood how heavy those feelings could be.

If she wasn't quite ready to face the likely reality, then that was fine. However, my soft smile and my touches seemed to be cracking the facade that she was holding in place at the moment.

So I held her close and wrapped my arms around her shoulders, squeezing her in a comforting hug. 

"They're fine," Zuri said again, though this time her voice cracked and I rubbed her back. She pressed her face into the crook of my neck. "They're fine. We don't know anything." 

"That's right, we don't know anything," I reassured her, rubbing her back even as I felt my anchor crumble against me. 

We both knew the reality. Her parents were almost assuredly a victim of Colin and his rampage through Avente. All signs indicated that where her father had been stationed had been completely taken over by Garrish mages. We had even seen units from that fort turned into mageforged.

Turning people into mageforged was not a short process, and if Avente was completely oblivious that the fort had been taken, that could only mean that it was completely and utterly annihilated. 

We had also learned that Colin had a penchant for devouring the souls of mages and anchors. Given how little restraint he showed attacking Miletus Fort, it was unlikely that her parents were still alive.

Zuri cried quietly against me before taking a deep breath and pushing off. "Thank you, Ard, but we don't have time for this.

“We will make time whenever we need. If anything, Zuri, I would prefer we take the time now, rather than have it come to surprise you after they've finished with the sand." 

"You're right," Zuri said, putting a hard smile on her face, one that looked rather forced. "But I've gotten out what I need to, and we need to get back to work." 

I knew just how much staying busy could help and nodded along, "Great, but I need your help. I have no idea what sort of defenses would work best. Maybe you could help advise me as I work to create more defenses against the other army."

***

Emlyn shook me awake. I came up with a start, spasming as I looked around, ready to see Garrish soldiers advancing on me with pikes and swords. 

"Calm down," Emlyn patted me on the shoulder. "They're just finishing up with the sand. I mean, you did bring a whole mountain of it down on them," she said. 

I gave her a big grin. "Well, I'm glad I got to get a little sleep." I rubbed the side of my head and got steadily to my feet, looking out at the advancing army. Zuri had me build a few towers, and traps built into the wall. Though, I was fairly sure they were mostly busy work.

True to Emlyn's words, the soldiers had completely cleared the sand off the pass and even begun to use it to fill the section I had washed down the cliff.

"That seems less than ideal," I commented. 

"It does," Emlyn agreed, "which is why Melida had me wake you up."

"You know, I was having a nice dream." I wiggled my eyebrows.

"I'm sure you were. But we need another way to stall them. Do you think you can destroy the cliff right underneath the front of the army?" 

I cracked my neck back and forth and stretched my fingers. "Well, I'm so happy you asked, Emlyn. You know, since you're now using some earth magic, why don't you pay attention to my awesomeness?" 

Emlyn narrowed her eyes at me, which was fair.

I was being a little obnoxious and I was going to blame my lack of sleep, or perhaps stress. It definitely was not because of any issue with my character. I was the pinnacle of charming.

I reached out to the ground underneath the army, only to start turning it to sand. A few feet of the cliff heeded my magic before I felt several mages begin resisting my efforts. I grunted, opening my sphere to its maximum, pushing magic into my soul.

Yet I felt more will’s struggle against mine. That's when I opened up further and touched on my soul magic, applying greater pressure. 

Several feet next to the cliff turned to sand and soldiers screamed as they fell off the cliff.

A moment later, an iron-strong will began to fight against me. It was like someone had just dropped heated iron in water. Suddenly the cliff was rock solid. 

"That's it," Emlyn encouraged me.

I grunted, still straining, pushing my magic and my soul against the cliff. Trying to shatter it into millions of tiny fragments and wash away the nasty army. I let out an explosive breath as I stopped. 

"Yeah, it's not budging." I frowned.

"I thought you were going to show me how it's done," Emlyn nudged me with her shoulder.

"Well, unfortunately, it seems I have more than a few mages on their end trying to stop me."

"Melida was afraid of that," Emlyn nodded. "Given the time they've had to prepare and the earth mages they've been using to clear the sand, there's no way all of those mages aren't on alert."

"Whatever it was, it was strong," I told her. "It was a single will. There were several that resisted me at first, and I was able to overpower those. But there was another." I frowned for a second. "There is probably one on the level of our elder mages in that army."

My words made Emlyn frown. "We have to tell Melida."

"After you," I gestured. Not having a clue where our commanding mage was now. I had been allowed to nap in a little guardhouse that I had built on the wall. It wasn't hard to find her once we got out, though. It wasn't as if the fort was very busy. 

Melida had a pile of spherical stones built up to her waist. The other mage pursed her lips when I appeared. "Was that little bit of sand your work?" She asked.

"Unfortunately," I started, "they have someone over there that's strong enough to stop me from collapsing the whole cliff again.”

“I figured they nearly got off taking the fort. There's no way they're going to back down, especially when they know how vulnerable we are." The older mage said.

"Melida," I said, hesitation in my tone. This was a ridiculous position to be in. As much as I wanted to play hero. There was a literal army and an elder mage out there.

She ignored me and pressed on. "They brought their mages forward and gave their men a rest. They're going to have a whole contingent of wolf mages holding every inch of ground that their soldiers are walking on as they move forward. We’ll have to press them how we can." She picked up one of the stones the size of her fist and tossed it up in the air several times. On the third toss, it didn't come back down. Instead, it launched itself into the air.

A whoosh sound rippled out from it as it soared through the noonday sky, exploding in a shower of sand. 

As it reached the other side, Melida clicked her tongue. "Normally it does better than that.”

“Seems I'm not the only one having performance problems.” I quipped back, causing Melida to give me an unhealthy amount of side-eye.

"Careful, or you'll encourage Finley far too much.”

“Have I awoken your sassy side?" I asked Finley as she frowned at me.

"It was awoken long before You, Ard," Finley confirmed. "You only made Melida sassy enough to play with me."

Melida pursed her lips. "Ard, think you can send all of these at them?" 

I looked at the pile of rocks and with a wave of my hand lifted them. "Don't think I can fire them individually. I'll just throw them as high as I can. I don't think throwing them one at a time is going to be very valuable.”

“You push them; I will help with direction." Melida said.

I could feel her magic touch on the stones alongside mine.

Lifting the pile, there had to be nearly a hundred that she had prepared. Our best bet would be that the mages couldn't stop each one.

Rather than give the enemy mages warning, I shot them all straight up in the air at only a slight angle. The single motion of my arm was like I was slapping someone at the end of my reach. 

Melida choked. "Warn a girl." 

I watched as some of the stones veered off course and others twisted in the air. It seemed she wasn't quite ready to do her part. Still, the bulk of them soared down into the army. It was rather hard to miss. Shouts rose up and some turned to sand like the first but others landed explosively, smashing aside soldiers and creating chaos. 

I watched as soldiers were shoved off the side of the cliff by panicking others, trying to get out of the way of the falling cannonballs.

Only a few of the stones actually landed but the rest caused enough fear and likely did more damage from the panicking soldiers. 

"You can tell when they have more conscripts than professionals," Melida snorted. "Either way, we'll have to prepare for battle."

"Aye aye, Captain," I shot back. 

"This isn't a ship, Ard. It's Officer Trevis to you."

"Aye aye, Captain," I winked at her and made her roll her eyes.

"I don't suppose we can start sending Maribelle in, can we?" Melida asked.

The maid was never far away. Turning, I found her several steps behind me having snuck up on me while I was talking to the other woman. 

"What do you think?" I asked, not wanting to send her in against her will. 

"There's about a dozen bodies ready," she said. "There weren't any others that were in good enough condition for you to restore."

I probably could have restored someone from scraps. However, she was right. The effort to do so was likely not where I needed to be putting my magic at present.

She sat down, and I felt her shove her soul into Soulgard.

Shoving it into one of the bodies, I set her loose. 

"How do we do this?" I asked Melida. "It's just us versus all of them. Maribelle won't keep them back indefinitely."

I watched as my anchor flew across the space between us and the army. She slammed into the soldiers, as mage-forged quickly jumped over the early ranks of soldiers. I knew immediately she wasn't going to last long. Death magic rippled out of her as she fought tooth and nail. And I felt her soul snap back into my body. 

Stalling them for only about 30 to 40 seconds was not as good as we had hoped. Their ranks quickly reformed and they began marching once again.

"What we need is a bottleneck," Melida changed tactics, "which we don't really have." She stared out at the advancing army. "Honestly, Ard, I think our strategy is to launch as much magic as we can from here. Then we will fight them in the fort if we can. Hopefully they don't…”

“What if they collapse it on us? Again," I interjected.

"Then we're fucked," Melida threw her hands up in the air. "I'm currently asking you to do the impossible, and I know that, Ard." She turned to me. "However, throughout all of the time I have known you, you have been somehow able to do the impossible."

“Oh?” I played coy, giving her a shit eating grin.

Melida rolled her eyes. "Please, Ard, for once, can you make a miracle on purpose?"

I grinned at her, my raven's sphere dumping magic into my soul. I gave a little shrug. "Of course. Let's try this one." I threw Cyam out of my shadow, the pitch-black horse erupting and charging at the enemy lines. 

Melida watched with a deeply furrowed brow, only for Cyam to fly into the air and transform into a massive, dark horse hoof. He continued to grow above the army.

As magic peppered the soul of the hoof, I fed Cyam as much magic as I could. He hit a critical point at being bigger than the cliff itself before slamming down.

Pillars of earth erupted underneath the hoof, catching it before it hit the soldiers. 

From where I stood, I could see the pillars cracking and crumbling under Cyam’s strain, but he still didn't manage to get to the soldiers underneath.

Maribelle had already been stuffed into a new body and was rushing the front line. At this point, snakes of shadow were emerging from Cyam's hoof, biting and nipping at the soldiers underneath. 

"Of course he thinks snakes are terrifying," I chuckled. 

"Wait, that's not you?" Melida asked, her brow furrowing. 

"No, that's my congratulations-you’re-a-mage horse.” I told her proudly.

“The one you asked if you could keep when I brought you from that little shithole?" Melida’s voice was incredulous.

"The very same," I let out a sigh of appreciation as I watched Cyam work. "He's grown quite a bit." 

Melida squinted at the horse hoof and then back at me, shaking her head. "We're gonna have to get a little more detail from your story when we're not about to fucking die." 

At this point, the soldiers broke into a charge, devouring the ground between us and the wall. Melida threw her hands forward, lightning racing from her fingertips to meet the soldiers at the front. She managed to fry some of them, but those deaths didn't matter. The army was an oncoming tide and there was always another soldier to replace those lost.

"Into the fort," Melida said, backing up along the wall. I kept stride with her, my four anchors with me. However, Maribelle was currently being carried by Emlyn. 

"Where's Eva?" I asked, glancing around. 

Melida pointed to the top of the fort, where I could see the gray-haired Uncle Valken. Eva was making beams of light that began to shoot into the advancing army.

 Lord Valken had said that she wasn't going to be anywhere near the front. He would remove her himself, if required; he couldn't risk her. 

I wrinkled my nose, throwing another ball of compressed fire behind me, only for Maribelle to gasp and sit up in Emlyn's arms. Emlyn dropped her like a hot potato, but Maribelle didn't miss a beat, catching herself and keeping up with us. 

"We're retreating already?" she asked, looking around. 

"It's a strategic maneuver," I said. "We're moving into the fort, so that we can fight in hallways.”

“The fort that they previously collapsed on us and we just rebuilt." Maribelle sounded dubious, although she followed along with my orders.

"The very same, but don't worry, you have me." I gestured at myself. 

Emlyn coughed. "You were there when they collapsed the fort the first time." 

"And I was otherwise occupied. This time I am focusing on not letting them collapse the fort. Tada. You’re welcome." We moved quickly. 

"Should it collapse, I will do everything I can to protect you from harm," Maribelle said. Glancing at my other anchors, she added, "At all costs we must keep Ard alive." 

"Yup. That's the job I signed up for," Aurelia said. 

As we entered the fort proper, the soldiers were nipping at our heels. We only had moments to prepare.